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Lather And Trace

Friday, 28 December 2012

I kind of like how my first swirl turned out. It wasn't exactly what I had planned, but pretty decent. There is kind of a crackle effect going on with the soap which I believe is from the Titanium Dioxide. From reading what others that have used it have posted, it does not happen in an ungelled soap, so I may try to prevent gel the next time that I use it.

Thursday, 27 December 2012

I was suffering soap making withdrawals. I decided I wanted to try swirling again one more time. I brought it to a thin trace, added my FO, split off a portion to mix with a blue mica, and my trace quite quickly changed from light to thick, so in the pot swirling was out. I ended up altering pouring one, then the other into the mold, then swirling with a chopstick. I am excited to see it cut. I am beginning to suspect I soap a little too warm, and think I will try a cooler temp next time.

I also did two other "firsts" for me today. I had purchased some Titanium Dioxide to whiten my soap. I got the water soluble type, so that was added to my lye mixture. I also added a pinch of raw tussah silk fibres to my lye mixture, which is supposed to add a very silky feel to soap. I found the vendor on Ebay, but she had her website printed on her invoice, http://www.missbabs.com/index.php . I bought 2 oz of the Tussah Silk Noil. 2oz is enough to tightly pack a ziplock baggie, and most soapers who use it recommend about a cotton ball sized pinch for 5lbs of soap, so this is going to last me awhile, considering my average batch is about 2lbs. I found it to be a really great value for something that could add a lot extra to my soap, considering I paid about $5 including the shipping.

For my fragrance today, I used Bonsai & Citrus Ginger which was highly reviewed by other soapers on the vendor's site. I was expecting a bit more of a sharp citrus note, but it's not what I expected. I love it, but it was really unexpected. The sandalwood and evergreen really tone down the femininity of the sweet citrus tones. This one is definitely going back into the rotation.

Friday, 21 December 2012

I unmolded and cut my coffee soap today. I like the look of it so far. When I took the picture the edges were darker than the center, but that has now evened out since all the surfaces have been exposed to air.

On it's own, I think the coffee scent is a little stark. I expected to love it more, because I love the smell of brewing coffee. It's not bad, it's just missing....something. I can't even define what it is. I do think at some point in the future, I will combine it with the Creamy Cinnamon Chai scent that I used in this soap as I think they will pair beautifully together.

As a side note, this is only my 6th batch of soap, and I can already see the difference in looks between this and my firsttwo attempts. Part of that is using the wooden molds I think, but the majority is just simply that I have gotten better. And if I have gotten this much better after just a few batches, how much more fabulous will the soap I make in year's time be? Many of the experienced soapers at www.soapmakingforum.com advocate waiting at least a year for those people wanting to sell, so that you can work out the kinks, and see how your soap holds up over time. I can absolutely see why that is.

Wednesday, 19 December 2012

I couldn't resist any longer. I had to make a soap that used coffee for the liquid.

Nothing too unusual to report, procedure-wise. I did lift my stick blender a bit to much at one point, and some raw soap splashed out of my container. It splashed away from me, but it could easily have splashed at me. It just really reminded me why the safety precautions are so highly stressed to us new soapers.

With that out of the way, here is the recipe I used today:

Total oil weight

1.5

Water as percent of oil weight

38 %

Super Fat/Discount

7 %

Lye Concentration

26.612 %

Water : Lye Ratio

2.758:1

Sat : Unsat Ratio

43 : 57

Iodine

56

INS

151

Fragrance Ratio

0

Fragrance Weight

0 Oz

Ingredient

Pounds

Ounces

Grams

Water

0.57

9.12

258.547

Lye - NaOH

0.207

3.307

93.752

#

√

Oil/Fat

%

Pounds

Ounces

Grams

1

Olive Oil pomace

40

0.6

9.6

272.155

2

Palm Kernel Oil

30

0.45

7.2

204.116

3

Palm Oil

20

0.3

4.8

136.078

4

Cocoa Butter

5

0.075

1.2

34.019

5

Castor Oil

5

0.075

1.2

34.019

Totals

100

1.5

24

680.388

Soap Bar Quality

Suggested Range

Your Recipe

Hardness

29 - 54

42

Cleansing

12 - 22

20

Conditioning

44 - 69

55

Bubbly

14 - 46

24

Creamy

16 - 48

27

Iodine

41 - 70

56

INS

136 - 165

151

Lauric

15

Myristic

5

Palmitic

18

Stearic

4

Ricinoleic

5

Oleic

42

Linoleic

8

Linolenic

1

I am just copying and pasting my soapcalc view recipe page, because I am too lazy to type. I think I may do this more often, because it has a lot of extra info I usually leave out when posting.

I also used Cappuccino Frgrance oil because even though coffee was my liquid, I have read the scent usually doesn't make it through. It behaved well, no acceleration, and because the soap is already dark, I wouldn't notice any discolouration if it does. Hopefully it'll hold well.

Tuesday, 18 December 2012

I used Margarita Fragrance oil, which has a lovely lime scent. I did scent it a bit stronger than I normally would, as I know citrus scents do not hold well in cp soap. Didn't notice any acceleration, and it is too soon to tell if there is any discolouration. If it holds well, this may become one of my go to scents, as I love citrus.

I also had some dried juniper berries, which I used a blender to grind up, and added at trace as an exfoliant.

And then, because this soap did not have enough going on, I decided to try an in the pot swirl. That part didn't go so well. I wasn't sure how much mica to use, so I only added a small amount of a dark red which left me with a strawberry-ish colour, and it wasn't a striking contrast to the rest of my batter. Then went I went to add it back to my "pot" to swirl it, I discovered that as the rubbermaid container I use is kind of narrow, and my trace was a bit thick, that I couldn't pour it as a swirl. It just layered on top of the batter already in my pot. I'm curious what it will look like when I unmold it.

As usual, no problems achieving a full gel.

Lessons learned from todays batch:

1) Use more mica
2) If trying ITP swirl, keep at a lighter trace
3) Use a container with a wider opening as the pot when doing an ITP swirl

I think I may need to hit a dollar store to get some plastic measuring cups to use in creating swirls, so I have something with a spout to pour with.